Top 30 GCP Interview Questions in 2023

Basic GCP Interview Questions for Freshers

1. What is Computing?

Computing refers to the use of technology to process information and perform various types of computations. This can include tasks such as data storage, data analysis, and problem-solving. Computing technology includes computers, servers, and other devices, as well as the software and programming languages used to operate them.

It also encompasses the study and development of algorithms, data structures, and other mathematical concepts used in computing.

In short, computing is the process of utilizing technology to process data and make information more useful and meaningful. It plays a vital role in a wide range of fields, from business and science to entertainment and communication.

2. What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud computing is the distribution of computing services over the Internet (“the cloud”), including servers, storage, libraries, connectivity, software, analytics, and intelligence, in order to provide speedier innovation, adaptable resources, and scale economies.

Cloud services can be broadly classified into three categories: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). With the increasing popularity of cloud computing, businesses and organizations of all sizes are able to take advantage of the many benefits it offers, such as cost savings, scalability, and increased efficiency.

3. What are the main features of cloud services?

Cloud service and cloud computing as a whole have a multitude of features, especially the ease of access and management of commercial software from anywhere around the globe.

Easy centralization of all management related to the software to a central web service
The design and development of web applications capable of handling multiple clients from anywhere around the world simultaneously
The elimination of software upgrade downloads by centralizing and automating the updating process

4. What is Google Cloud Platform?

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) is a collection of cloud computing services offered by Google that runs on the same infrastructure that Google uses internally for its end-user products such as Google Search and YouTube.

GCP offers a wide range of services including computing, storage, networking, big data, machine learning, and the internet of things(IoT) that enable organizations to build, deploy and scale applications on the same infrastructure as Google.

GCP provides a variety of tools and services that allow users to develop, deploy, and manage their applications and data on Google’s infrastructure. These services are designed to work together seamlessly, providing a flexible and cost-effective solution for businesses of all sizes.

With GCP, organizations can take advantage of the scalability, security, and performance of Google’s infrastructure to power their applications, without the need to invest in and maintain their own data centers.

5. What are the advantages of using cloud computing?

First, let us compare Google Cloud with AWS Cloud:

Criteria	Google Cloud	AWS
Data Centers	Relatively less	Large number
Market Position	In top three	Market leader
Entry in cloud	Late entrant	Very early entrant

The advantages of using cloud computing are many. Here we will discuss some of the most important advantages of the cloud. You will be able to store and have a backup of the data anytime, it has powerful server capabilities, improves productivity, cost-effectiveness and time saving, ability to get up and started in the shortest duration of time.

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6. Mention platforms that are used for large-scale cloud computing?

The platforms that are used for large-scale cloud computing are Amazon Web Services, Azure, Google Cloud Platform, and more.

7. What are the different models for deployment in cloud computing?

The various deployment models in cloud computing are private, public, and hybrid cloud.

8. How can a user gain from utility computing?

Utility computing is the service wherein you get pay-as-you-go and on-demand services in which the provider offers to manage and operate the computing services and you can choose which services to access which are all deployed in the cloud.

9. When you are transferring data, how do you ensure that it is secure?

To ensure that the data which is being transported is secure, you should check the implemented encryption key and that there is no leak in the data.

10. Describe the security aspects that the cloud offers?

Some of the important security aspects that the cloud offers are as below:

Access control: it offers control to the users who can control the access to other users who are entering the cloud ecosystem
Identity management: this provides the authorization for the application services
Authorization and authentication: this security feature lets only the authenticated and authorized users access the applications and data.

11. What are system integrators in Cloud Computing?

The cloud can consist of multiple components that can be complex. The system integrator in the cloud is the strategy that provides the process of designing the cloud, integrating the various components for creating a hybrid or a private cloud network among other things.

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12. What are the various components of the Google Cloud Platform?

The various GCP components are:

Google Compute Engine
Google Cloud Container Engine
Google Cloud Storage
Google Cloud App Engine
Google Cloud Dataflow
Google Cloud Machine Learning Engine
Google BigQuery Service
Google Cloud Job Discovery
Google Cloud Endpoints
Google Cloud Test Lab

13. What are the main advantages of using Google Cloud Platform?

Google Cloud Platform is gaining popularity among cloud professionals as well as users for the advantages they offer over others :

GCP offers competitive pricing
Google Cloud servers allow access to information from anywhere
GCP has an overall better performance and service compared to other hosting cloud services
Google Cloud provides speedy and efficient server and security updates
The security level of Google Cloud Platform is exemplary; the cloud platform and networks are secured and encrypted with various security measures.

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Let’s move onto the intermediate section of Google Cloud Architect interview questions and answers.

Intermediate GCP Interview Questions

14. How does cloud computing provide on-demand functionality?

As a technology, cloud computing was built on the foundation of providing functionality to all its users on-demand at any time and from anywhere. With the latest advancements and easy availability of applications like Google Cloud, it has achieved that goal.

A user on Google Cloud can view the files on the cloud on any device at any time from wherever they are as long as they are connected to the internet.

15. What are the various layers in the cloud architecture?

The different layers that constitute the cloud architecture are:

Physical layer: This constitutes the physical servers, network, and other aspects
Infrastructure layer: This layer includes storage, virtualized layers, and so on
Platform layer: This includes the operating system, apps, and other aspects
Application layer: This is the layer that the end-user directly interacts with.

16. What are the libraries and tools for cloud storage on GCP?

JSON API and XML API are at the core level for the cloud storage on Google Cloud Platform. But along with these, Google also provides the following to interact with the cloud storage.

Google Cloud Platform Console to perform basic operations on objects and buckets
Cloud Storage Client Libraries that provides programming support for various languages
Gsutil Command-line Tool provides a CLI for the cloud storage

There are also a number of third-party libraries and tools like Boto Library.

17. What is “EUCALYPTUS” in the context of cloud computing?

“EUCALYPTUS” stands for “Elastic Utility Computing Architecture for Linking Your Programs To Useful Systems”, which is an open-source cloud computing infrastructure that is used for deploying cloud clusters. Using the “EUCALYPTUS”, you can build public, private, and hybrid cloud platforms. You can even have your own data center in the cloud and this can be used to harness its functionality in your organization.

Learn about the differences between AWS, Azure, and GCP in this blog by Intellipaat.

18. What is Google Compute Engine?

Google Cloud Engine is the basic component of the Google Cloud Platform. It is an IaaS that provides flexible Windows and Linux-based virtual machines that are self-managed and hosted on the Google infrastructure. The virtual machines can run on local, durable storage options, and KVM.

For the purpose of control and configuration, Google Cloud Engine also includes REST-based API. It integrates with other GCP technologies (Google Cloud Storage, Google App Engine, Google BigQuery, etc.) that help extend its computational ability thus creating more complex and sophisticated applications.

Know about GCP architecture through our detailed blog!

19. What are the different methods for the authentication of Google Compute Engine API?

There are different methods for the authentication of Google Compute Engine API. They are:

Through client library
Using OAuth 2.0
Directly using an access token

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20. Why do you need the virtualization platform to implement the cloud?

Virtualization lets you create virtual versions of the storage, operating systems, applications, networks, and so on. If you use the right virtualization then it helps you to augment your existing infrastructure. You are able to run multiple apps and operating systems on existing servers.

Check out our blog on Google Cloud SQL to enhance your Knowledge!

21. What are some of the popular open-source cloud computing platforms?

Some of the important open-source cloud computing platforms are as below

OpenStack
Cloud Foundry
Docker
Apache Mesos
KVM

Check out this video on Google Cloud Platform Tutorial

22. Explain what are the different modes of software as a service (SaaS)?

The two most important types of software as a service are as below:

Single multi-tenancy: In this type of SaaS you have your own independent resources that you don’t share with anybody
Fine grain multi-tenancy: In this type of SaaS deployment the resources are shared between multiple tenants even though the functionalities remain the same.

23. What is the benefit of API in the cloud domain?

Here we list the important benefits of API with respect to the cloud domain:

You don’t have to write the complete program
You can easily communicate between one application and another
You can easily create applications and link them to the cloud services
It seamlessly connects two applications in a secure manner.

Let’s move to the advanced section of Google Cloud Architect interview questions and answers.

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Advanced GCP Interview Questions for Experienced

24. Mention what is the difference between elasticity and scalability in cloud computing?

Scalability in the cloud is the way in which you increase the ability to service additional workloads either by adding new servers or accommodating them within the existing servers. Elasticity is the process by which you can either add or remove virtual machines depending on the requirement in order to avoid wastage of resources and reduce costs.

25. What are the service accounts? How will you create one?

This is one of the most common Google Cloud interview questions. Service accounts are the special accounts related to a project. They are used for the authorization of Google Compute Engine in order to be able to perform on behalf of the user thus receiving access to non-sensitive data.

There are different service accounts offered by Google but mainly, users prefer to use Google Cloud Platform Console and Google Compute Engine service accounts.

The user doesn’t need to create a service account manually. It is automatically created by the Compute Engine whenever a new instance is created. Google Compute Engine also specifies the scope of the service account for that particular instance when it is created.

26. What are projects in the context of Google Cloud?

Projects are the containers that organize all the Google Compute resources. They comprise the world of compartments and are not meant for resource sharing. Projects may have different users and owners.

27. Suppose you have deleted your instance by mistake. Will you be able to retrieve it back? If yes, how?

While It is a very simple question, it is based on a deep understanding of the Google cloud platform. The answer is no. It is not possible to retrieve the instances that have been deleted once. However, if it has been stopped, it can be retrieved by simply starting it again.

28. What is Google BigQuery? What are the benefits of BigQuery for data warehouse practitioners?

Google BigQuery is used as a data warehouse and stores all the analytical data in an organization. It organizes the data table into datasets.

Some of the benefits of BigQuery for the data warehouse practitioners are:

BigQuery allocates query and storage resources depending on the requirement and usage. Therefore, it doesn’t require the provisioning of resources before usage.
It can store data in different formats for efficient storage management. For example, Google’s distributed file system, proprietary format, proprietary columnar format, query access pattern, etc.
It is fully maintained and managed without any downtime or hindrance.
It provides backup and disaster recovery at a broader level. Users can easily undo changes and revert to a previous state without making a request for the backup recovery.

29. What do you know about Google Cloud SDK?

Google Cloud SDK (Software Development Kit) is a set of tools that are used in the management of applications and resources that are hosted on the Google Cloud Platform. It is comprised of the gcloud, gsutil, and bqcommand line tools.
Google Cloud SDK runs only on specific platforms like Windows, Linux, and macOS and requires Python 2.7.x. Other specific tools in the kit may have additional requirements as well.

30. What are the Google Cloud APIs? How can you access them?

Google Cloud APIs are programmatic interfaces that allow users to add the power of everything (from storage access to the image analysis based on machine learning) to Google Cloud-based applications.

Accessing Google Cloud APIs

Cloud APIs can be easily accessed with the client libraries from the server applications. A number of programming languages can be used to access Google Cloud APIs. One can use mobile applications via Firebase SDKs or through third-party clients. Google Cloud Platform Console Web UI or Google SDK command-line tools can also be used to access the Google Cloud APIs.

Learn about the certification in Google Cloud in a structured way in our blog on the GCP Certification path.

Name	Date	Details
AWS Certification	03 Jun 2023(Sat-Sun) Weekend Batch	View Details
AWS Certification	10 Jun 2023(Sat-Sun) Weekend Batch	View Details
AWS Certification	17 Jun 2023(Sat-Sun) Weekend Batch	View Details

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Top 30 GCP Interview Questions and Answers

Top Google Cloud Interview Questions and Answers